


get the picture of your dreams

by prusfockers



Category: Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
Genre: Dorks in Love, First Kiss, M/M, Photographs
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-03
Updated: 2018-03-03
Packaged: 2019-03-23 22:51:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,417
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13798020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/prusfockers/pseuds/prusfockers
Summary: The thing about photography is how it immortalizes moments. And smiles.





	get the picture of your dreams

**Author's Note:**

> english is not my first language, so if you find something really off, please let me know, this story is not beta'd and i can only do so much - again, shout if you find something horrible
> 
> title from lorde's white teeth teen

 

On the night of Peter's sixteenth birthday, Mr. Stark drops by only to toss him a car key, to which moment May almost has a heart attack over the simple possibility of Peter driving. Well, he particularly believes that her fear comes from the sight of Michelle’s grin. Besides those handfuls minutes, it's only the four of them in the apartment.

There are pizza and Thai at the coffee table, a nineties sitcom passing unnoticed on tv. They chat and laugh; May, as always, tells his friends the same old childhood stories, both hers and Peter’s, over and over again. Peter tells them new ones after a while, about Spider-Man mostly, because any other thing that happened to him, Ned and MJ were there to laugh at his choices of word or acts.

MJ gifts him with a copy of The Demon-Haunted World and Billions and Billions: Thoughts on Life and Death at the Brink of the Millennium. Ned gets him a big, fancy box of Star Trek, the original series.

It’s Aunt May who gets him this ugly, battered old thing. She claims it looks vintage, but Peter knows the truth -- he doesn't really care about it just being cheaper. But her smile is kind of uncertain and that cannot do, so Peter presses his camera onto his chest the same time he hugs May closer. He whispers a hundred thank you’s, kisses her cheek, and straps the camera around his neck.

Peter first picture is of his wonderful, wonderful family; out of focus because he tries for a selfie. He’s crushed between his two best friends and Aunt May is behind him, hugging him by his shoulders. They are smiling so bright and their eyes are shining with so much happiness, that Peter’s bruised jaw seems to disappear.

And that night, after he drags both mattresses down to his bedroom floor and puts all the available covers upon them, Peter sits cross-legged, messing with the camera settings, trying to figure out its functions and how it works. Ned is the first to sleep, belly down and left arm under the pillow, but soon enough he is mumbling and talking to Michelle -- because Ned is talkative even is his damn sleep. She's lying down too, leaving enough space for Peter to lay between them.

That is how his second picture looks like. It's from Ned. And Michelle, of course. The moment that gets immortalized is the other boy still sleeping, mouth forever stopped mid-sentence. Michelle is looking at the lenses, pointing a finger at Ned.

Later, when she looks at the result after snapping the camera away from him, Michelle’s lips twitch, eyes glittering as if she knows something Peter doesn’t know.

Nothing out of ordinary, if he dares say so. He loves the photo as much as the first one.

 

*

 

Peter cleans a space on his wall after he manages to sneak into the school’s labs and prints the photos. He makes an amplified copy of Uncle Ben’s and his parent's pictures. He also re-arranges his posters and even put some things away; pins his (undeserved) decathlon medal and his ticket to Berlin because even with the trip being about him stealing Cap’s shield and get his ass beat by a giant man, he still got to be somewhere else.

(He shows his friends the vlog he made after a while. Ned is half out of his mind with every second of it, Michelle just hums and says: “Cool. Still a loser, tho.” He sends both of them the video. She doesn’t delete hers.)

 

*

 

Peter makes a habit out of caring the Thing everywhere. Yep, he named it because that's how you show love, you name things. That is what Aunt May says at least, and the Thing becomes a respected member of Parker's clan.

He starts making money after he starts to web Thing around strategic corners, it's hard shell being practically indestructible. Selling Spider-Man photos is not ideal, but he needs cash, so... And he is careful to sell it to places where he’s sure won't get his name dragged through the mud. One bad experience is already too many.

Peter also creates an anonymous youtube account, where he updates short videos Ned makes of him being all hero and stuff. Sometimes, if he feels like it (or left his laptop open near MJ), he posts the weird ones she manages to capture surprisingly often. After a month he has enough subscribers to make some profit out of it, too.

He deletes whatever other social media he has, so scared he is of identity reveals and weird villains coming after the people he knows. When he wants to save new memes, he uses Ned’s login for the bunch of media he has. When he wants to know what's happening in the world beyond New York City, he spies MJ super political twitter and even gets hold of her Snapchat to chat with Liz, mostly to apologize non stop.

As for all the pictures he keeps taking, they are saved in a hard drive Tony has made specifically him, proclaiming to be total and complete unhackable. It is. (He checked.)

He keeps printing, too. Pining some into the wall, putting others onto a plastic folder. It's his most precious possession.

 

*

 

The three of them go to The Last Jedi premiere at the local movie theater.

Ned is dressed as a pilot, bright orange suit and black helmet -- he spent over seven months getting right. MJ is wearing an anti-Rylo t-shirt, purple lightsaber in hand. Peter is dressed as himself because the truth be told, he is much more of a Star Trek fan. It doesn't bother the others, though, because after five minutes waiting for midnight to come, he somehow becomes the official photographer of the event.

He snaps shots of everyone, but most of his friends with others - Darth Vader, because it is a classic and even Peter has to admit it. Both Leia as a princess and as a general (the woman dressed like the latter spends thirty-seven minutes with MJ after the movie ends, talking about toxic relationship representation and bad writing. Ned agrees in silence. Peter pets him on the shoulder.) But Peter’s favorite picture of the night is one he asked a stranger to take. It's a simple one: turns out the three of them are actual shit at playing a character, so they are standing in front of a giant poster, arms over shoulders and heads thrown back in laughter.

That's just it.

(He tries to hide his smile when he sees it in MJ chat background two days later.)

As for the movie, he totally says that Star Trek Beyond is immeasurably better. He records Ned agreement and oh boy, he couldn't be happier.

 

*

 

Michelle and Ned’s birthdays comes and goes and Peter has a memory card full of blinding smiles and dirty cake faces. He spends a lot of money printing them. It's so worth it.

 

*

 

Now, this is how it starts, actually: they are sitting in the cafeteria, eating lunch. It's sometime during fall. Peter is photographing their gross food and MJ is nose deep in some book when Ned decides to chatter about things differently than his usual Q&A, now in special edition: Avengers.

“Can you take a picture of me?” The tone of his voice is casual, without the usual curiosity that is so characteristic of Ned. It's like he's talking about the weather. Michelle is the one to talk next.

“I’m sure Peter already has a bunch of them,” is her dry comment. He just frowns, puts the camera down.

“Yeah, but they are of all of us together,” Ned fidgets around his plate, not looking at them. “And you know,” he gestures vaguely, “I was wondering if I could get one alone an-”

“And I’m sure Peter already has a bunch of them,” she repeats. This time Peter narrows his eyes at her.

“And what, Ned?” he urges on.

“And maybe I could use them?” his voice is uncertain now, like he’s actually asking them. “I- I heard Cindy talking about Tinder.”

Oh. Peter thinks. Oh.

MJ looks at him with her knowing eyes, frowning; sitting straight. See, Peter is not sure how Tinder works, be he sure as hell knows what it is for.

Michelle shakes her head.

“Yeah, Ned,” there is an unsettling feeling in his guts. The Thing is now too heavy around his neck. “Of course.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> kudos, comments, critics and random chat are always welcome, just remember to be nice folks // tumblr - prusfockers


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